


Afflicted

by lulahbelle



Category: Brideshead Revisited (2008)
Genre: Drunk Sex, Drunkenness, First Time, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-03-01
Updated: 2013-03-01
Packaged: 2017-12-04 00:31:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 673
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/704413
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lulahbelle/pseuds/lulahbelle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Charles called to a refusal and was gradually aware of its total absence.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Afflicted

**Author's Note:**

> I began this a while back and have now been inspired to push towards finishing it because of Matthew Goode's absurdly pretty face. This is a rewriting/extension of the wine tasting scene in the film because I feel like Charles never did reject that kiss. 
> 
> This is multi chaptered and is Explicit by the end.

The light of the world had slipped from reach and the continuing canvas of the heavens that hung behind the shadow of Brideshead House were a dimming wash of blue and pink.

After hours spent cloistered in a warm study taking on various fine wines Sebastian and Charles were now outside sampling a breath of fresh air. 

"Oh dear, what on earth happened to the sunlight?" Sebastian asked.

"Think we may have drunken it." Charles said full of amusement.

"Really? Well, I mean I did think that last Claret a touch fizzier than normal for wine, but I should never have guessed why."

Hours earlier, before they had given up theory for practice, they had read a wine tasting manual full of pompous comparisons and taken to repeating them to one another at odd moments and sure it would delight Sebastian Charles resurrected one.

"You found it a touch golden do you mean, like King Arthur's chalice?" Charles said.

Sebastian emitted a rich giggle and his reply, "Why yes of course!" all at once.

"Ah I found the wine more silver myself. Like the moon, dancing over the Great Lakes."

Charles' deliberately grandeloquent phrasing was precise as he attempted to fight the slur of inebriation and his own chuckle but Sebastian's reply was a free, audibly drunk cry of. "Oh Charles, don't be so silly! Surely it was more of a teal colour! Like a peacock feather!"

"Oh my, you're actually quite correct." Charles said with mock astonishment.

Alcohol had led all their conversations for the day to a languid laughter and again, as expected, it serenaded this outburst. 

Upon the end of this merriment, a silence, borne of their days of isolated companionship, claimed them and within it they each looked out to the rolling grounds of Sebastian's ancestral home; the acres of green land stretching massively into the distances and the majestic fountain beyond, each glowing more brilliantly with every second of the sunset progressing overhead.

Charles, an artist, whose basic loyalty was towards the appreciation of beauty, felt an obvious awe at this world he stood before. His thoughts hung for several, suspended seconds upon the pleasing symmetry of his dearest companion being equally as materially fortunate as he was lovely.

For Charles this calming sense of equity in the face of wonder had been the very essence of his stay but he'd done his best to keep any applause he felt for the magnificence of Brideshead to himself thus far. He was not a person given to much outright display of his internality as a rule and he was growing surer each day that Sebastian viewed the relics of his wealth as very high burdens indeed.

Now though, influenced by trust and wine intermingled, Charles felt wantonly candid and confessed without care.

"If I had ever lived in a place such as this I would never have left it. You're so splendidly lucky Sebastian."

Dressed only in his burgandy silk pajamas and a robe because of his continuing pretence at an illness Sebastian said nothing, just blazed a reserved resentment towards the comment from his caved eyes, as inside him annoyance pierced through the previous fog of contentment.

Within his friend's rapt fixation on his families' artifacts Sebastian spied a competitor and one he should eventually have to loose to. Objects, so unthinking and effortlessly splendid were easy to love, whilst a person, such as himself could not be, at least not all the time. Focus would become hard to come by someday, he knew it. 

Fond of Charles' as he was he found that hard to take.

Inside Sebastian's head it was the shortest second between this angst and a stroppy wonder why he should bother trying to seek love at all. After all something, the same thing really, always ruined it.

Resolving not to be gloomy, disagreeing with the turns of his mind, Sebastian took Charles' arm in his at that moment and said simply.

"Come, I think it's most silly of us to have stopped drinking."


End file.
